abandonware games sorted by popularity

It’s cyber. It’s puck. It’s… basically cyberpunk air hockey with attitude. 3D Cyberpuck is a futuristic sport simulation from 1992 that nobody asked for, y...

Infocom really went off the rails with Nord and Bert, and bless them for it. This is a text adventure not about dragons or spaceships, but about puns. Yes, literal wordplay puzzles...

By 1996, Sensible World of Soccer 96/97 had evolved into something much larger than a simple football game. Players could dive into leagues from around the globe, manage transfers,...

Virus is a fast, strange little arcade game that feels as though someone took a futuristic flying machine, dropped it into a hostile landscape, and then removed any concern for sen...

In Commander Keen 2: The Earth Explodes, the stakes go from “oops, stranded on Mars” to “uh-oh, Earth is doomed.” The Vorticons have planted death lasers in...

Tennis Elbow is where tennis simulation starts to get serious, almost suspiciously so. The physics are detailed, the controls precise, and the learning curve steep enough to scare ...

Hoyle Book of Games is a collection of classic card and table games presented in a single package, making it the sort of software that could quietly become the default entertainmen...

Noctropolis feels like stepping into a fever dream of a comic book you read when you were twelve and maybe shouldn’t have. A surreal noir adventure with gothic heroes, femme ...

Often overlooked, Falcon AT from 1988 is an interesting hybrid that tries to bridge hardcore simulation with a slightly more accessible presentation. While it still respects the se...

Ikari III: The Rescue takes the military action of its predecessors and adds one crucial ingredient: punching. Released in 1990 for DOS, it shifts from run-and-gun chaos toward bea...

_Jetset_, released in 1982, belongs to the pioneering era of computer gaming when developers worked wonders with limited technology. The game combines arcade-style action with fast...

Perry Mason is a 1985 adventure game based on the famous fictional lawyer, bringing courtroom drama and investigation to the computer screen. Players take the role of Perry Mason, ...

Ultima 2 asks the pressing question: what if you mixed time travel with fantasy and a truly mean sorceress named Minax? The answer is chaos. You’ll bounce between eras—...

Super Mario Kart remake brings the familiar kart-racing formula into a fan-made package that celebrates the chaotic spirit of Nintendo's classic. The basic ingredients are all here...

The Global Dilemma: Guns or Butter is a strategy game built around one of humanity's oldest political questions: should you spend your resources on military power or on keeping eve...

Eye of Horus, released in 1989, is a puzzle-adventure that leans heavily into atmosphere and mystery. Drawing inspiration from ancient Egyptian mythology, the game challenges playe...

1999’s BitStorm is what happens when someone decides to make a strategy game and forgets to put the brakes on the caffeine. It’s fast, it’s furious, and you&rsquo...

Super Mario Fusion: Revival is a fan-made platform adventure that mixes classic Mario-style gameplay with a more modern homebrew approach. The emphasis is on jumping, collecting, e...

Crown is a strategy game from an era when computers were perfectly happy to make you read the manual before allowing you anywhere near the throne. Its central appeal lies in planni...

X-Men 2: The Fall of the Mutants is a curious blend of action and light strategy, where Marvel’s famous mutants get to stretch their powers across a series of loosely connected m...

Crusade in Europe is a detailed World War II strategy game that lets you take command of the Allied or Axis forces during some of the war’s most famous campaigns. It’s ...

Deadly Racer is basically what happens when someone at the office said, “What if racing, but everyone might die?” Released in 1994 for DOS, it’s a fast-paced, rou...

By 1994, RPG fans were spoiled with titles like Might and Magic and Ultima. Then along came Disciples of Steel, a brutally complex, turn-based fantasy epic for DOS. It drops you in...

Never mind is a 1989 DOS game whose title sounds like the developers briefly remembered they had a deadline and decided to release the game anyway. Beneath the wonderfully casual n...

Before there was Baldur’s Gate or Skyrim, there was DND. This 1984 DOS dungeon crawler is as old-school as it gets, complete with ASCII graphics, endless hallways, and monste...

Mirror Magic is a clever puzzle adventure built around mirrors, reflections, and the delightful realization that optical illusions can be considerably more complicated than they lo...

Before the IOC cracked down on fun, Caveman Ugh-Lympics gave us the primeval sporting event we never knew we needed. Clubs, fire, and the 100-meter mate drag—yes, that’...

First Samurai is a classic action-platformer game originally released in 1991. The game was initially available on the Amiga and Atari ST, with later ports to the Commodore 64, DOS...

Back in 1983, IBM Centipede brought arcade bug-blasting straight to home computers, allowing office machines to moonlight as insect exterminators. This adaptation of the arcade cla...

Bank Streek Writer Plus is a word processor from the DOS era, when writing on a computer still felt like a fairly sophisticated trick. Applications such as this one were expected t...